EP306 - Top 10 episode Master My Garden podcast 2025 : Top Ten Garden Favourites 2024

Ever wonder what gardeners truly need when the skies won’t clear and the soil stays cold and heavy? We open the vault on six years of downloads to reveal the ten most-listened episodes and the lessons they teach us about resilient design, living soils, and planting that thrives despite the weather. This is a practical, story-rich tour through the conversations that changed how we grow.

We start with structure and colour: smart garden design and June Blake’s vivid plant choices that keep borders alive for months. Then we head underground. Dr Elaine Ingham demystifies the Soil Food Web, turning biology into decisions you can make at the bed edge. Charles Dowding’s no-dig approach shows the payoff of compost and calm soil—fewer weeds, better moisture, and crops that root fast. Along the way, we unpack the enduring pull of companion planting, from predator-friendly flowers to classic pairings that cut pests without chemicals.

Craft and adaptation anchor the middle of the list. Compost coach Kate Flood maps hot heaps, worm farms, and bokashi to your space and schedule so you can turn waste into a reliable soil engine. We revisit organic growing with Klaus Leitenberger for varieties that actually like Irish summers, and we tap into Niall Macaulay’s creator mindset for simple, repeatable techniques. A surprise chart-climber—growing lavender in Ireland—proves that the right hardy varieties and drainage can deliver scent and pollinators even in a soggy year. We round out with wildflower meadows guided by Sandro Caffola, a masterclass in building habitat and beauty together.

By the end, you’ll know where to start, what to try next, and which episodes to queue up for specific goals—better soils, cleaner beds, longer bloom, and crops that cope. If this countdown helps you plan your next season, follow the show, share it with a gardener who needs a lift, and leave a quick review so we can keep shaping episodes around what helps you grow most.

Chapters

• 0:00 Setting Up The Yearly Top Ten
• 1:44 Weather Woes And Gardening Impact
• 3:32 How The Rankings Work
• 3:48 New Entry: Garden Design With Jane
• 4:41 Colour-Driven Planting With June Blake
• 6:00 Compost Deep Dive With Kate Flood
• 7:12 Companion Planting Part One Mystery
• 9:05 Soil Food Web With Dr Elaine Ingham
• 11:15 Organic Growing With Klaus Leitenberger
• 12:46 YouTube Insights With Niall Macaulay
• 14:10 Growing Lavender In Ireland
• 16:10 Wildflowers With Sandro Caffola
• 18:05 No-Dig Lessons With Charles Dowding
• 20:10 Solo Episodes That Nearly Cracked It
• 22:05 Why Popularity Shapes Future Topics
• 23:35 Recap And What’s Coming Next

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:11

How's it going everybody? And welcome to episode 306 of the Master My Garden Podcast. Now, this week's episode is one I always cover this time of the year as we sort of close off or round off with Christmas. And it is the top ten most popular podcasts. And the way the way it's done is that it's the cumulative number of downloads of an individual episode across the lifespan of the podcast, which at this stage is you know five heading for six years. And yeah, the list has changed quite a lot over the last number of years, and I always exclude the episodes that are purely just myself. But the list, the list has definitely changed, and I think it's always a good you know, it's a good indicator of what's really popular and you know what people resonate with. So yeah, I think it's it's always a good one to listen to. Uh the list, as I say, changes and evolves over time. Hasn't been a huge amount in the last couple of years change in the top two or three. It'll be interesting to see if that changes. Um it could potentially it could potentially change a little bit this year, so it's going to be interesting to see. Um before we get into the top ten and chat about all these brilliant episodes. What about this weather for the last sort of six weeks? So it's just the rain today has been phenomenal, and that's on top of all the rain that has fought fallen over the last week. Storm Bram has you know landed in Ireland over the last week and caused yet more flooding and and and some damage from trees and so on. So yeah, it's been a really, really wet time. I will do the kind of review of the year next week, which kind of looks back over the course of the year and what the trends were, both for growing, for gardening, for the weather, and for the podcast itself. But uh yeah, it's been a it's been a horrible, horrible couple of weeks, and really making it difficult, especially for people in the bare root business or people looking to get some bare root work done, because it has been just so so wet. Uh certainly finished the bulb season quite quickly, and you know, there was still still is time to plant, but of course the wet and the uh the wet and the and the the amount of rain that's fallen is really really causing that to be slowed or stopped, to be honest. Um but anyway to to get back to this, as I say, the top ten episodes of the podcast, and it's always always interesting to look back on it, and for me, it always gives me a good indication of you know what what people resonate with, as I say. Um as I mentioned, any that is just myself, I'll drop out of the official top ten, but I will tell you that there is four or five of episodes with just myself that are in the top ten, and I actually quite like that. The fact that there's you know, they're not all just these, some of the names are kind of big names within gardening, and the fact that some of my own episodes are in the top ten, I quite like that to be honest with you. So we'll start off with number 10, and this is a new entry to the number 10, and it's an episode that was released in September 2022, and it is Garden Design Tips with Jane McArkril, and Jane runs her own uh garden design and consultancy business uh outside of Dublin, and yeah, she does a lot of commercial work, a lot of work for private clients, commercial work as I say, commercial projects, uh for councils and all that sort of work. So she does all that type of thing, but I remember that episode particularly was you know filled with really kind of good tips, good ideas, and talking about a lot of trends of the time. September 2022 it was released, and that this year I think is the first year it has been in the in the top ten, but a brilliant episode. Number nine on the list is one that has been consistently in the top ten since it was released, all the way back in July 2022, and it was an episode with June Blake, and I suppose what was so good about that was June Blake and her garden up in County Wicklow would be well known for how vibrant the colours are, and you know, it's a really special garden in terms of the summer colour and the blast of colour that you get up there. Um, a lot of hot borders, as she described herself in the in the episode, but she mentions how she achieves this with you know the different types of plants and so on, and that episode really, really resonated and does continue to resonate with people, and that's episode 132. Always a good one to go back to because as I say, there is plant names, plant choices in that that are really really good to you know, really good to kind of if you're putting together a border to get a list of plants that you'll be able to put your your your border together or your plant system together with that. So that's a really, really good one to get back on. The next one is another new entry into the top ten. It's one that I knew would would come into the top ten, and it was an interview I did with Kate Flood, who's the compost coach, affectionately known as the compost coach. And you if you're on Instagram, you should definitely follow her. She is amazing at all things compost. And we talked about everything in that episode. I remember she was sitting in her car doing it, and uh she was in the the countryside in Australia. You could see the trees in the background, and we started chatting, and it was nice and bright, but it was heading for evening time, and by the time by the time the conversation finished, she was in complete darkness in the car uh chatting away to me. But we talked everything from Bakashi bins, hot composting, slow composting. We even chatted about roadkill and how you can use that to activate compost bins. It was a really interesting chat, and it was around the same time that she had launched her own book, uh, which is called The Compost Coach, but it went through every type of composting, the you know, the process, how to achieve the results and the pros and cons of each individual type. Uh so it was a brilliant, brilliant episode, and that is in at number eight. Number seven on the list is one that has been consistently in the top ten was released, and it's companion planting part one. And every year, this baffles me. Part what this was uh part one of uh companion planting with Tanguy from Dunmore Country School. So it was one episode one week, the following week was part two. They were both superb episodes. Number one, the the part one is in the top ten, so that means it's getting a huge amount of listens. The part two is way down the list, and it makes no sense because they're completely connected and linked, um, and people are definitely resonating with it. It's not that somebody listened to part one and thought part two wasn't worth listening to. Part one is is huge numbers, and part two is just way down the list. I can't make sense of that part, to be honest, but that's the way it is. So we chatted about everything in that episode to do with companion planting, and you know, it was companion planting in a very basic format, in terms of you know, putting beneficial plants that would attract in beneficial insects into your garden to help with pollination with insect control and so on, but also companion planting in the sense that one works with the other, like the three sisters and and so on. So we chatted about all those things, and that was episode 59. It was released all the way back in May 21. Part two was the following week, as I say, and they continued to be hugely popular. Well, part one continues to be hugely popular and is still in the top 10. Another one that took a few years to get into the top 10, but I kept saying that it would get there, and it certainly has this year. And it's a significant one, it's a significant episode anyway. Um it's episode 125, and it's with Dr. Elaine Ingham from the Soil Food Web. And for anyone you, any of you that are not familiar with Dr. Elaine's work, she she bit not she didn't invent the soil food web, but she has definitely done a lot of the research that people use today in terms of soil health, in terms of nutrition, in terms of all the cycles that go on in in the in a proper functioning soil. Uh really really good on explaining it from a scientific perspective, but in a way that you know you and me can understand. And as I say, ground groundbreaking work over a long period of time. The reason I think it's particularly significant this year is that Dr. Alang retired recently from the Soil Food Web. Now, of course, she has set up, she did uh was one of the founding members of this of the soil food web, and they now have consultants and training, and you know, you can become a soil food web consultant. So her legacy and the work that she did will continue because you know there's a lot of these people getting trained up all over the world now, and taking those principles and bringing them to their you know their own countries, and the principles work everywhere in the world. So, as I said, significant this year, but also I knew it was one that would break into the top ten. I think it did last year, but it's certainly pushing up the list now, and it's one that really any everybody will get benefit out of if you're you know just gardening at home or if you're market gardening, whatever the case may be, there's huge benefit in it because the knowledge, the knowledge that she has built up over a long career in soil health, you know, really came to the fore, but in a simple ter in simple terms, terms that as I say, you and I could understand. So that's number six, Dr. Elaining, and significant this year because as I say, she's recently retired. Uh next one, number five on the list is Brilliant Gardener, Klaus Leytenberger, and that was all the way back in October 2020, so a long time ago, and it has always been a popular episode, kind of goes up and down through the top ten, but it's episode 39, and we chat about all things organic growing. Klaus, as you know, mentioned him so many times on the podcast in terms of his books and all that sort of thing. But he, you know, chatted about good varieties, certain crops, uh, principles, his principles of growing, which is you know, organic growing. He chatted about growing in Ireland, top tips for as I said, varieties and ways of doing things and uh things that he's found over the years, and it was just a really informative episode. As I listen back to some of these over time, I would record or would have completely different interviews now, I guess. And I suppose as I at the end, when I talk about maybe the episodes myself, definitely there's things you know, you you evolve and the information evolves, and what I know evolves, and you'd have a di if you if you've interviewed that person today, it would be you know a different style or a different interview and would take a different angle. So that's why sometimes it's good to have people back on. Um but that that episode, which is number five on the list, Klaus Leitenberger, excellent, excellent episode. The next one, number four on the list, has been always quite popular. Uh he's a very popular, very popular gardener, very popular on YouTube. It's Niall Macaulay, so it's Nile Gardens, is his YouTube channel. And he did go on afterwards and win the Alan Titchmarch young Young Gardener or Young for his YouTube channel, Young Influencer of the Year, Young Gardener of the Year, I'm not exact exactly sure, but it was a huge award, uh, well deserved, and that episode has always been quite popular, number four, and that was all the way back in June 2022. Niall, lovely guy, great, great episode, and we chatted about lots of things, kind of his tips for gardening. Uh it was at that time we we focused on a recent episode uh or an episode that he had just released on his YouTube channel, and we talked about you know the the principles and the theories that he was talking about and that, and it was a really, really, really good one. Uh, number three on the list is surprised to me, but it has climbed the list hugely this year, and it's How to Grow Lavender in Ireland. Now, I do I did write a blog post, which I never do to be honest with you. Um, not very good at writing. Um, sorry, I'm okay at writing, but I just find it cumbersome. Don't I prefer talking than than writing. But I did write a blog post, and I think this has contributed to the the rise in popularity of this because I embed the podcast episode into the into the blog post, and it's how to grow lavender in Ireland. And it was an episode all the way back in June 21, I think, and it was with Myra Hart from Wexford Lavender Farm, and that's a famous lavender farm down in County Wexford, has the big purple door in the middle of it, and one that's famous for photographs and weddings and all that sort of stuff. Um, but we talked about how to grow lavender successfully because, as you know, lavender is a crop or is a flower that pretend that likes to have drier conditions, and we certainly we certainly can claim to have that here. But if you're growing the right varieties, you can be very successful with it, and that's what the episode was kind of centred on, and yeah, that up that is all the way up in in number three now, and I think people are finding it because people want to grow lavender uh and they're finding maybe struggling to get it to grow, or they you know want to have a good you know, a good display of lavender, and somebody has said that it's difficult to grow, and then they've looked it up and they've found the podcast through this blog post, which is driving the driving the listens on that particular episode, and yeah, it seems to be, but it's a new new entry into the top ten and certainly certainly a very good episode when it comes to that specific topic of growing lavender. We talk about the you know the using the hardy varieties, the mud mundstead and the hit coat, as opposed to you know the more European varieties that you might see out there. Number two and number one, no change, and hasn't been a change for a couple of years, and and it's no real surprise to be honest with you. Number two on the list is episode 26, and it goes all the way back to July 2020. And it was an episode that I recorded in person with Sandra Cofola, who is, as I've said many, many times, the ec the foremost expert on wildflowers in Ireland. He knows everything that there is to be known about wildflowers, and we chatted about everything to do with you know wildflower meadows, um, how they're creating ecosystems within people's gardens, about his business, which is you know purely selling wildflowers, and yeah, it's a it was a brilliant, brilliant episode, really funny, witty, smart, uh everything that you would expect from from Sandro as as I said, the the top expert on wildflowers in Ireland, and that's number two and continues to be the second most popular. The most popular episode of all time goes all the way back to February 21, and it is the number one for the last couple of years, and it's Charles Dowding. And strangely enough, somebody mentioned it to me recently, and I was on a bit of a drive, and I said, I must listen back to that. And I listened back to it only recently in the last couple of weeks, and yeah, they say you should never listen back to yourself. But uh, if I was doing that interview tomorrow again, it will be totally different. Now, there is reasons for it at the time. I was familiar with No Dig, but had never practiced it. Since then, or almost since that time, I've been pretty much all the veg garden has been exclusively no-dig gardening, and so now I have at that time I was asking questions about how to and what to expect. Now, with the experience that I've built up on in no-dig gardening, I already know a lot of the you know the results-based stuff, what I'm gonna see, what's gonna happen, um, how to set it up. I know all that stuff now. So I think the conversation would be very, very different. I must actually you know see can I get Charles Charles back on at some point in time or or possibly even see could we could we do something in person at some point. But yeah, it it's it's number one, continues to be number one. It's number one by a nice distance, but not not as much as it used to be. So all the others are pushing up towards it. Um but it's definitely if I if I listen back to Sandro's episode, I probably wouldn't change a whole lot in it. It's you know it's quite similar to what I would do if I was doing it today. But certainly the likes of Charles is one, it would be a totally different interview. More because I know so much more about it now than I did at that time, and I have the experience of a few years of using No Dig. But yeah, I listened back to it recently and I was going, Wow, did I really ask that question? But I asked it because at the time I didn't know, and now I do know, so it's you know, it takes time and things things do evolve and change. Just want to mention the few, as I say, I don't put them into the top ten, but some episodes with just myself that are well, actually, there's four four five of them that would be in the top ten in terms of most popular. So just to give them a quick mention, there's one the highest one is the top ten perennials to sow in autumn for summer. Uh so you're essentially what we were doing in the grow along this year and the seeds that we were growing in that. But this went all the way back to August 2022, and it was going through a list of top 10. And I know a lot of people used that episode to go on and grow their own seeds that they ended up in putting into their own gardens. And that one, that one is actually way up the list. Um Would don't have the actual numbers there in front of me, but I think from memory if I put it into the top ten, it would be up around number three or number four. So that was hugely popular. What to sew in the month of March, the you know, the monthly sewing sewing guide ones, there's almost every one of them are just there thereabouts in the top ten. Uh so that's good to see as well. Another one which is not one of my own, just outside the top ten, but continuing to be really popular, is Perennial Veg with Patrick Hunt. And yeah, there's a lot of the a lot of the how-to video or the what to sew this month, those ones are all up there in terms of most popular. So it's really interesting. There's you know, there's a lot of episodes, a lot of good episodes there, and there is some kind of bits of change within within the within the top ten. I suppose there's lots that I still feel are potentially better than some of the ones in the top ten. Uh there's some you know, even as I think back on it myself, there's some really exceptional interviews and even individual ones with myself that I feel are more beneficial. But yeah, the the the most popular is the most popular, it's the ones that are being listened to, it's the ones that are being downloaded. And yeah, it's uh it's nice to look back on it, and it is nice to at this time of the year to see again what is resonating with people and what's um what's driving the listens, because then that will dictate what will you know what will be popular and what will be useful for people going forward. So yeah, that's um pretty much this week's episode. Next week's episode is the final recap of the year. So I do like to do that one. Again, we look back on the growing year, we look back on the the podcast year, and we sort of have a summary of all of those things, listeners and so on. And then the podcast will be taking a little break. I'll go through all that next week, though, no need to mention that now. Um, but for this week, that's it. The top ten, just to run through them one more time. Number ten was episode 144 with Jane McCarkle, the garden design tips. Uh number nine was June Blake, brilliant episode on colour in the garden. Number eight was the Kate Flood, the compost coach, again super. Number seven was Tanguy from Dunmore Country School with companion planting. Number six, Dr. Lane Ingham from the Soil Food Web. Uh as I say, significant now that she has retired. Uh, number five is Klaus Leytenberger. Number four was Nile Macaulay from the Nile Gardens YouTube channel. And number three was How to Grow Lavender in Ireland. Definitely one that shocks me that it's up there, not because it's not good, but because it's such a niche topic. But obviously, you know, it's something that resonates with people, or it's something that people are searching and looking for. Uh, number two, no surprise to me, Sandra Cofola. Uh, and number one, again, Charles Dowling continues to be hugely popular and talking about the principles and no dig. So, yeah, that's uh that's the run through. Uh, next week we'll we'll chat about the the overview of the podcast, the overview of the growing year, and then we'll wind down for a well-earned break. But that's been this week's episode. Thanks for listening, and until the next time, happy guards.